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Animal Farm: A Fairy Story
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George Orwell’s famous satire of the Soviet Union, in which “all animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.”
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Start ReadingBook Information
Animal Farm: A Fairy Story
Description
George Orwell’s famous satire of the Soviet Union, in which “all animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.”
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I didn't expect to like this book as much as I did. Maybe b/c my husband kept saying he didn't like it b/c it was too sad at the end! I found it to be a very profound fable of sorts, reminiscent of Lord of the Flies, where evil nature permeates everything. Even in attempts to correct wrongs, we are creating new wrongs that are perhaps worse.
Rating: 5Whilst Animal Farm is deservedly praised as the allegorical classic that it is, an eye opening surprise is the preface included at the back of this edition. This original preface was not included despite space being allowed for it in the first edition. In it Orwell eloquently discusses press censorship and how the orthodox is unquestioned whilst legitimate but unfashionable ideas are ignored or lampooned. At the time Russia was a war time ally, and Stalin's brutalities were going ahead unreported and there was alot of looking the other way. On censorship he differentiates between the voluntarily imposed, the imposed by pressure groups and those where there is a vested interest. He gives examples such as patent medicine rackets (Big Pharma anyone?) and scandals involving priests, which at the time were being covered up by the power of the Catholic church. He was writing all this 70 years ago and it is sad to think not much has really changed.
Rating: 5A good socio-political commentary that may fly over the heads of some readers, but should be required reading nonetheless.
Rating: 4An allegory using farm animals as a society experimenting with socialism, and realizing too late the mistake they have made in accepting it.
Rating: 5By far, one of my favorite books of all time. This satirical masterpiece infuriates me when reading it. I can't help but love the juxtaposition of humans and animals as the same thing. It screams of the rejection of Communism and other forms of totalitarian governments. In fact, I would not be surprised if this book was still banned in Russia. Overall, its bleak view of humanity and life in this cruel world can be a bit much, but also makes us think about ourselves. Do we not treat each other like animals sometimes?
Rating: 5I had always thought this excellent novel about the ways and means of achieving tyranny was a commentary on Stalinist USSR, but Emma Larkin in her book Finding George Orwell in Burma says the template was the oppressive regime in Myanmar. Now with the US elections underway democrats see it as representative of the republican party. Propaganda is an essential tool and a chorus of sheep is necessary to drown out reason. Timeless political commentary.
Rating: 5We all know the story: the animals revolt against the humans and take over the farm. They have reason, though, as Mr. Jones is a dissolute farmer who is letting his land and animals fall to pieces. Originally, they are fueled by Major's dreams of equality among all animals, but almost as soon as the revolt is successfully concluded, the ideal of Animalism begins to go astray. The pigs, the more intelligent of the animals, usurp more and more power. After Napoleon manages to rid himself of his only real opponent - Snowball, the idealist who is really trying to apply equality and improvements for the other animals - the pigs use clever rhetoric and manipulation to place themselves as the absolute leaders and recipients of the wealth that the other animals labor so hard to produce. Eventually, the seven commandments of Animalism are reduced to one corrupted rule: All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others. Of course, the story is an allegory representing Stalin and the communist party in Russia. Most of the characters in the story have a historical counterpart: Napoleon represents Stalin, Snowball is elements of Lenin and Trotsky, and Squealer is likely Molotov. Some of the animals represent groups of people; for instance, Boxer is the working proletariat, and Benjamin stands for the intellectuals who disapproved of the new regime but didn't take any action. This book is a given in the classroom, and yet somehow I never was assigned to read it. I needed to rectify this gap in my literary repertoire. I wonder if I can say I enjoyed a book that was so nihilistic. Well, I did, because it was a fascinating and well-written story. Knowing the background and most of the plot before I read it, I could focus more on the significance of the allegory and craft of the writing. The style is a narrative that is descriptive without fancy flourishes, reading like a simple recounting of historical events. The straightforward tone is undercut by the use of irony, as the narrator is telling the story from the lower animal's point of view, who accept the pigs' propaganda and excuses while the reader realizes the truth behind the lies. Also, it was a fast read, with just ten short chapters. I was surprised at the ending. Somehow, I thought the pigs were deposed at the end as a consequence of their wickedness; lo and behold, they actually consolidate their power and develop human features. Orwell had a bleak outlook for our future. Thankfully, Stalin's regime was not as indestructible as he envisioned, and the terrible future Orwell prophesied in both of his major novels has not come to pass. Nonetheless, it was an eerily accurate presentation of what Socialism had become in Russia, and books like these can only help to serve as warnings against the what-may-be of totalitarianism.
Rating: 4An absolute must read! The animals at animal farm take over the farm and we see with our own eyes clearly how a brilliant idea turns into the tyranny of one group of people (pigs). This is the story of all the tyrants throughout history and how they landed where they did. Sadly this is also beginning to be our own story here in America....Oh that we would learn. Quotes: "Comrade, can you not understand that liberty is worth more than ribbons?""If she had had any picture of the future , it had been of a society of animals set free from hunger and the whip, all equal, each working to his capacity, the strong protecting the weak...""and yet the animals never gave up hope. More, they never lost their sense of honor and privilege in being members of animal farm." "All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others."
Rating: 5Since its publication in 1946, George Orwell's fable of a workers' revolution gone wrong has rivaled Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea as the Shortest Serious Novel It's OK to Write a Book Report About. (The latter is three pages longer and less fun to read.) Fueled by Orwell's intense disillusionment with Soviet Communism, Animal Farm is a nearly perfect piece of writing, both an engaging story and an allegory that actually works. When the downtrodden beasts of Manor Farm oust their drunken human master and take over management of the land, all are awash in collectivist zeal. Everyone willingly works overtime, productivity soars, and for one brief, glorious season, every belly is full. The animals' Seven Commandment credo is painted in big white letters on the barn. All animals are equal. No animal shall drink alcohol, wear clothes, sleep in a bed, or kill a fellow four-footed creature. Those that go upon four legs or wings are friends and the two-legged are, by definition, the enemy. Too soon, however, the pigs, who have styled themselves leaders by virtue of their intelligence, succumb to the temptations of privilege and power. "We pigs are brainworkers. The whole management and organisation of the farm depend on us. Day and night, we are watching over your welfare. It is for your sake that we drink that milk and eat those apples." While this swinish brotherhood sells out the revolution, cynically editing the Seven Commandments to excuse their violence and greed, the common animals are once again left hungry and exhausted, no better off than in the days when humans ran the farm. Satire Animal Farm may be, but it's a stony reader who remains unmoved when the stalwart workhorse, Boxer, having given his all to his comrades, is sold to the glue factory to buy booze for the pigs. Orwell's view of Communism is bleak indeed, but given the history of the Russian people since 1917, his pessimism has an air of prophe
Rating: 5My choice for Orwell Day (today, 21 January, is Orwell's birthday).
I'm not sure how many times I've read Animal Farm, and I don't know that I have anything particularly profound to say about the book itself that hasn't been said many times before and often more eloquently. What I do want to say, though, is how much I enjoyed this particular audiobook edition read by Simon Callow. The various voices and accents he gives to the characters are great fun: in particular he seems to be channelling Robbie Coltrane for the voice of Napoleon! A very entertaining reading of a classic from Orwell.
Rating: 4I'm not sure how many times I've read Animal Farm, and I don't know that I have anything particularly profound to say about the book itself that hasn't been said many times before and often more eloquently. What I do want to say, though, is how much I enjoyed this particular audiobook edition read by Simon Callow. The various voices and accents he gives to the characters are great fun: in particular he seems to be channelling Robbie Coltrane for the voice of Napoleon! A very entertaining reading of a classic from Orwell.
I've read 1984 over and over but I hadn't finished Animal Farm until just now... And, honestly, it's almost the same story. The elite are in charge and always at war with each other, while the Everyman works and works in deplorable conditions because 'hasn't it always been that way?' I totally understand why lots of schools include Animal Farm on their reading lists, but I think that when they teach it as an allegory for life in Britain, they should it to draw more universal conclusions. Students clearly don't understand this book.
Rating: 4I must be about the only person alive who was never assigned this novel in school, but I have finally read it at the age of 33. I can see what it is assigned in schools. It is a political allegory of historical significance that is written in a straight forward enough manner that it would be easy for adolescents to read and study it. For that purpose it works.For my purpose as an adult hoping to get something more personal out of the novel, it falls a bit shorter. As a history buff, I did enjoy it as a political allegory about the perils of those who would take advantage of an ideology in order to craft out more power for themselves. In this case, this is carried out by the pigs who clearly represent the Communist Party of the Stalinist USSR. However, this is not a particularly novel idea in the twenty-first century, so I felt that it was less powerful to a contemporary reader than it would have been in 1945. It is, however, a good book of great historical importance, I just wouldn't put list it among the best books that I, a twenty-first century reader, have ever read.
Rating: 4Satire at its best. A work of genius. This book will live on forever.
Rating: 5I'm going to assume you have read this book.Probably in high school.Even if your English teacher was not the best teacher you ever had, you probably got most of what there is to get in Animal Farm. It's a straightforward book; Mr. Orwell makes sure that everyone understands his point. While the communist revolution may have started well, may have even brought peace, prosperity and equality for a while, Stalin soon seized power and destroyed all that was good about it. I'm a firm believer that Mr. Orwell's best work can be found in his non-fiction; there's nothing in Animal Farm to compare with Homage to Catalonia or essays like "Shooting an Elephant", but the story is still a good one, the critique of Stalinism is still a damning indictment and, unfortunately, Animal Farm still has a message relevant to our time. Even for those of us who never lived under Stalin.Consider three examples:1. In Animal Farm there is a pig named Squealer who has, as his sole function, the job of convincing all the other animals that what their leader, Napoleon, the evil pig who represents Stalin, is doing is the right thing to do. Squealer must face the animals and lie to them, cajole them, convince them that what they saw with their own eyes or lived through themselves, is not what really happened. Squealer is Napoleon's spin-meister, the media pig who corrects the story and tells everyone what "really" is true. This keeps the animals from questioning their society, keeps them working from day to day without raising objection to how they are treated by those above them. Squealer is the agent who convinces everyone not to question the status quo. He must make everyone believe that the pigs should eat better food and while working much less than they do.2. The dedicated, devoted worker Boxer, a draft horse, gives his all for the cause. Whenever anything goes wrong, Boxer takes it upon himself to work harder, to get up earlier than before, work later, do more than his fare share, all he is capable of doing, to make sure that the job gets done and done as well as it can be. Boxer never complains about the effort he puts into his work, never holds anyone else's lack of effort against them, never questions those in charge. He has faith that his work will be rewarded one day with retirement to the pasture set aside for him and for others where he can peacefully live out his old age. Instead, when he has worked himself so hard he can no longer do much of anything, he finds the retirement pasture has been given over to growing wheat for the production of beer drunk only by the pigs in charge and he is sold to a glue factory.3. By the novel's end a few pigs are living the high life while the rest of the animals gain nothing from their labor. They are told that they are better off than they were before under the oppressive farmer, and many of them still believe it, but the readers know this is not so. The pigs are better off, surely, but the rest of the animals suffer to make this possible.Sound familiar?Darn that George Orwell.
Rating: 5"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others" - Well, that pretty much sums it all up in one sentence, doesn't it?
I was apparently one of the few I know that never read this book in high school or college, and also never studied the Russian Revolution. However, based on what I've read about it, Orwell managed to tick everyone off with his version of it, played out through the various animal characters. This book is a teacher/professor's dream of a book to discuss in class.
The characters are so rich, so highly developed - you either want to stretch through the book and protect them to no end, or just do away with them for being such jerks! Orwell so eloquently chooses just the right animals to match their "human" counterparts. I found myself cheering for Boxer (equated on some sites as "the working peasant population") and really hating pigs in general.
Fantastically and wonderfully surprised - I'm looking forward to reading more Orwell as a result.
Rating: 4I was apparently one of the few I know that never read this book in high school or college, and also never studied the Russian Revolution. However, based on what I've read about it, Orwell managed to tick everyone off with his version of it, played out through the various animal characters. This book is a teacher/professor's dream of a book to discuss in class.
The characters are so rich, so highly developed - you either want to stretch through the book and protect them to no end, or just do away with them for being such jerks! Orwell so eloquently chooses just the right animals to match their "human" counterparts. I found myself cheering for Boxer (equated on some sites as "the working peasant population") and really hating pigs in general.
Fantastically and wonderfully surprised - I'm looking forward to reading more Orwell as a result.
Listened to the audiobook version. I enjoyed it. I like this type of book
Rating: 4Although I'm almost sure I read this as part of a required high school English class, I decided I should read it again, just in case! This book takes on a different context as an adult reader.
Rating: 4Fascinating. I read this with my 14 yr old daughter (who also loved it).. For a classic, it was a quick, easy read i.e. great book to introduce teenagers to classics. And yet, it is profound in it's message and lingers with you long after you put it down.
Rating: 5I liked it very much. It is short, but to the point. The last scene was quite shocking
Rating: 4Simply and beautifully written. A powerful message related to modern times.
Rating: 5Not really my cup of tea. Also, it was a bit hard to follow as an 8th grader, especially considering we hadn't learned about communism and socialism yet. That unit came after reading the book (bc that is helpful).
Rating: 3It's a light read but scary good. Hell, it's just scary in general, and sad. A masterpiece.
Rating: 4 ohh, those pigs are crafty! Set on a farm in rural England, where the animals are incited to revolt against their human masters and start to run the farm themselves. The inital dream of a rural idyll is soon eroded by the actions of the pigs, and they way the confound the other animals. They invent 7 commandments that are seen to change over time as the pigs decide to rewrite the rules in their own favour. The lies that they tell to pull the wool over the eyes of the other animals get more and more outlandish as the story progresses, to the extent of writing history to prove their point. I thought this would be difficutl to read, but it's actually quite short, about 100 pages, and isn't taxing. However, I imagine the essay that you could be set on this are probably a great deal more difficult than the source text!
Rating: 4I don't remember reading this in high school - I suppose we had choices of 'good' books and I picked something else. I put it on my list because one of the 8th grade teachers had the students read it together as a class and I was in some of the class sessions... and what I read/heard was intriguing. It only took me a day to read it, mostly because I could hardly put it down. I kept getting more and more angry at Napoleon and the things that he was doing, and then thinking about the real story behind the story.... and it made me upset. As I got closer to the end, I got more frustrated with the sad plight of the animals and more pissed off at the pigs in charge. At the finish, I was disgusted with the way the animals' lives turned out - I was really moved, and to me that makes an awesome book. I can easily see why so many people felt strongly about communism and Russia after reading this book (or hearing about it). At least, Russia is no longer under Stalin and is a lot more free than during those times.
Rating: 5This is an analogy for the rise of the Soviet Union. A classic story that shows how power corrupts. It's short and to the point. Enjoyable.
Rating: 4I loved Nineteen-Eighty-Four when I read it, so I'm not sure why I never got round to reading Animal Farm. It was one of those things I heard about but didn't really hear any details about. Somewhere I heard about it being about communism, or Stalin, or something, but didn't remember where and that didn't really pique my interest...
Well, and then I saw it on the ridiculous list of one hundred books -- or whatever it is -- that someone thinks most people will only have read six of. So I mooched it and decided to read it soon, in a spirit of defiance. Not that I wasn't doing well already, with fifty-seven books...
Anyway. The book itself is easy to read. Easier than I was expecting, maybe. I know someone who decided to discount it because it's "about talking animals" and "no one could take that seriously". It's meant to be a fairy tale type thing, though; it's meant to reflect on the truth. It's political writing. It's perhaps less comprehensible to people who didn't live through the Cold War -- communism wasn't really that much of an issue in my life except that there were vague references to it in history class and it came up once I started doing some philosophy at university.
I've read other reviews saying it's too easy to read, too simplistic. I'd have to agree that it can't cover all the complexities of history and politics and people. But I don't think it's meant to, I think it's meant to be a simplified, more universal version, exploring communism-going-wrong. I don't think it necessarily says that communism is impossible, either -- you have to draw that conclusion for yourself.
The writing itself isn't stellar, I suppose, in that it doesn't light fireworks and dance and sing. It's pretty matter-of-fact and down to earth. I liked it a lot, though. I think that added to the ease of reading and understanding.
Rating: 5Well, and then I saw it on the ridiculous list of one hundred books -- or whatever it is -- that someone thinks most people will only have read six of. So I mooched it and decided to read it soon, in a spirit of defiance. Not that I wasn't doing well already, with fifty-seven books...
Anyway. The book itself is easy to read. Easier than I was expecting, maybe. I know someone who decided to discount it because it's "about talking animals" and "no one could take that seriously". It's meant to be a fairy tale type thing, though; it's meant to reflect on the truth. It's political writing. It's perhaps less comprehensible to people who didn't live through the Cold War -- communism wasn't really that much of an issue in my life except that there were vague references to it in history class and it came up once I started doing some philosophy at university.
I've read other reviews saying it's too easy to read, too simplistic. I'd have to agree that it can't cover all the complexities of history and politics and people. But I don't think it's meant to, I think it's meant to be a simplified, more universal version, exploring communism-going-wrong. I don't think it necessarily says that communism is impossible, either -- you have to draw that conclusion for yourself.
The writing itself isn't stellar, I suppose, in that it doesn't light fireworks and dance and sing. It's pretty matter-of-fact and down to earth. I liked it a lot, though. I think that added to the ease of reading and understanding.
The reading of Animal Farm plunged me back to senior school. My English Lit class had this as one of our O-Level reads about the same time as we covered the Russian Revolution onwards period in the history O-Level Class. Our teacher for English Lit was an enthusiastic chap who really enabled us to see beyond a series of farm animals talking. In many ways it gave a degree of concept to the political history of Russia at that time and the country it was to become. We truly have no idea of how frightening it must be to live in such a Country where there is no democracy. Where you work, live and believe what the regime tells you to if you don't the consequences are harsh and so much more. I wonder what prompted Orwell to write such a book. I know he spent time in India although he died here in England, but I would be interested to know what his catalyst was. Perhaps the stories of what was happening at the time simply prompted his creativity or was there more to it?
Rating: 4While I can understand and appreciate the metaphoric language and concepts in the book, I found it to be dull and repetitive. It was easy to predict what was going to happen next based on nearly every word said throughout the text. I struggled with the amount of personification in the animals (culminating in the "transformation" of the pigs to humans), particularly the amount of English they were able to read and speak, even with other humans.
Rating: 2The comparision between animals and humans as the perfect utopian society declines slowly is interesting. It shows how communisim just doesn't work. The ending, although not happy, is inevtiable and provides a moral for the story.
Rating: 5Ah, Animal Farm. According to the copy I had, this book was published during August of 1945, when US dropped the bombs on Hiroshima. It was written during WWII and reflects some of the Russian attitudes during that time. I feel that this is an important book to read, although perhaps not in conjunction with Orwell's other dystopian book, 1984.
"All animals are equal; some animals are more equal than others." Sadly, some of this sentiment rings true today. In a world stratified by class, the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer. In a way, this book reminded me also of Lord of the Flies. A pre-existing government is overthrown in name of what everyone at first believes might be the best possible ruling, only for things to head steadily downhill.
Is Animal Farm an important book? Yes, I believe so. It still has themes that hold true today. Is it antiquated? Uh...without being familiar with the Communist regime and its practices...yeah...maybe a little. A student reading this would be better suited with background knowledge than to head into it cold turkey.
It was a good book, but it wasn't amazing. I'm not sure, had I been one of those people in charge of proclaiming "classics", whether I would have put it there. There are universal truths in a lot of books, not necessarily the oldest.
Rating: 4"All animals are equal; some animals are more equal than others." Sadly, some of this sentiment rings true today. In a world stratified by class, the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer. In a way, this book reminded me also of Lord of the Flies. A pre-existing government is overthrown in name of what everyone at first believes might be the best possible ruling, only for things to head steadily downhill.
Is Animal Farm an important book? Yes, I believe so. It still has themes that hold true today. Is it antiquated? Uh...without being familiar with the Communist regime and its practices...yeah...maybe a little. A student reading this would be better suited with background knowledge than to head into it cold turkey.
It was a good book, but it wasn't amazing. I'm not sure, had I been one of those people in charge of proclaiming "classics", whether I would have put it there. There are universal truths in a lot of books, not necessarily the oldest.